By Canadian Press

Review board hears mass killer doing well, should have unsupervised outings

Sep 17, 2019 | 1:56 PM

EDMONTON — A psychiatrist in charge of treating an Alberta man who stabbed and killed five young people at a Calgary house party says the patient’s risk of re-offending is low.

But Dr. Santoch Rai has told the Alberta Review Board that if Matthew de Grood was to commit another offence, it would be severe.

A judge in 2016 found de Grood not criminally responsible for the killings because he was suffering from schizophrenia at the time.

A trial heard that de Grood believed the devil was talking to him and a war was about to begin, signalling the end of the world, when he arrived at the party in 2014.

The review board decided last year that de Grood, with his mental condition in remission, could be transferred from a secure psychiatric hospital in Calgary to Alberta Hospital in Edmonton.

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Rai says de Grood takes his medication and should be allowed to have unsupervised trips into Edmonton as well as be eased into living in a group home.

Zackariah Rathwell, 21; Jordan Segura, 22; Kaitlin Perras, 23; Josh Hunter, 23; and Lawrence Hong, 27, were killed at the party, which was being held to mark the end of the school year. 

The Canadian Press